Living Death In The Moment
by WordsAblaze
Summary: Simon Lewis has been through a lot but never has he had to balance all his troubles completely alone, hiding his pain so deep that only the sun and moon know his true emotions... angsty simon-centric piece because his life really isn't fair, enjoy!


_Look. I love our nerdy vampire. But I have feels regarding his current situation in shadowhunters. And he seems to be an angst magnet. I'm sorry..._

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 **Living Death In The Moment**

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It had never occurred to Simon that loneliness would hurt the most.

Pain isn't new to him.

He's been targeted by bullies, he's fallen off his bike, he's seen his mother crumple under the power of hopelessness, and he's watched his best friend leave him behind without a moment's hesitation. Said best friend had apologised and he'd understood that circumstance had made things worse than they actually were so being impulsive had been the only option, but that's not the point. Pain can't really be a foreign concept to someone who's had to climb out of their own grave but, now, he can't help but think he'd been so blind, so naïve, so clueless to think he had any idea at all.

It's funny, he notes, how pain always finds a way to become stronger, to become deadlier, to become so much worse than the worst. He'd never imagined such pain but, as he looks around the small room he'd called his bedroom for the better part of his childhood, he can't think of a time when the world didn't feel like it was crumbling around him, a time when everything was alright.

Raking a shaky hand through his hair, he sighs, wondering where it had all gone wrong and why. Maybe it was when peer pressure made him drink from Heidi or maybe it was when he was foolish enough to try and stay in touch with his family but, regardless, he's stuck in some kind of liminal space between clinging to his past and letting go of it entirely.

It's like time isn't applicable to him right now because he could swear the sun had just set but now it's shining brightly at the top of the sky and ruining the pathetic fallacy of his apartment. If Clary was here, he thinks, she might have drawn a sun with his face on it to make him laugh. Then they'd joke about nostalgia and he'd scribble something to tell her he's grateful and she'd hug him, sending him one of her genuinely warm smiles... but she's not here and she probably won't ever be because he might have killed her. She, just like everyone else he loves, is gone and it's all his fault.

Her surprised smile flashes before his eyes and he groans, grabbing his phone and calling, calling Maia because he doesn't know what to do anymore. He's not disappointed when she doesn't pick up, she'd warned him she'd be out of contact and the number was more so he knew not to ignore her calls, but a part of him is so frustrated that he doesn't even notice when the metal bends under his fingers. He does, however, notice when tiny shards of glass dig into his skin and sharp pain becomes his most prominent thought.

"I can't even blame the stupid mark for this one," he says quietly, then sighs, dropping the remains of his phone.

As much as he wants to, he can't go back to his mother and ask her to just smile and tell him she loves him because, to her, he's dead. And he is dead, but not in the way she thinks he is, the way she only thinks he is because he hadn't been strong enough to try and persuade her he isn't evil.

Something inside of him screams in agony – probably his heart – as he crosses everyone off his mental list of who to try and find. He can't go to Hotel Dumort because Raphael is gone and he doesn't know if the clan will accept him back, especially not when he has a brutal defence system installed on his head. He'd feel too guilty going to any of the Lightwoods, especially since one of them is barely alive – it doesn't help that he's probably made the worst impressions on every Shadowhunter in the city. They don't have any reason to help him so he sees no point in proving their belief in his weakness right.

Magnus, in spite of the ridiculous names he uses, has always made himself an option for when advice or a shoulder to cry on is needed but he can't bring himself to go because Magnus has enough on his hands, even more so since his hands aren't magical at the minute. He hates himself for not being able to help his favourite warlock but there's no way he can do anything without being a danger until he gets himself under control.

Any other time, Luke would know something was wrong and he could tell him anything but, with Clary gone and Maryse de-runed, he figures Luke has enough to worry about without him adding to the mess. It's not like he's an urgent problem that needs to be solved; he's just an infinite jigsaw that fails to abide by the laws of logic.

He leaves.

He leaves his room and his confusion behind and runs, runs as far as he can manage without keeling over. Of course, he keels over eventually, but, by then, he's in an area he can't recognise. Somehow, it makes him feel better. His unnecessary breathing comes easier as he collapses under a conveniently-angled blossom tree.

It's ridiculous how quickly the sun is throwing its red and purple glow over him, the shadows of light falling over his hands and looking like blood stains. This only makes it so much worse, reminds him of the potential blood on his hands, makes the world all seem so much more fleeting and fragile. He wishes he could turn back time to when breaking his glasses was the biggest worry of his life. He wishes he could go back to when the name of his band was on his mind more than the tastes of different blood groups. He wishes he could pretend nothing had happened to the oblivious life he'd been more or less happily living.

His wishes are in vain.

No matter how hard he wants to forget this new, unpredictable side of the world, he won't ever be able to and he knows it. He thinks about it all night, watching as the moon comes and goes with as much ease as his composure. In the morning, he settles on leaving behind his crossroads and sitting down.

He's been so focused on trying to move on, trying to build himself a life, that he hasn't stopped to consider he might be all he has.

And so, he smiles. He smiles and grins and babbles on about nothing in particular. He smiles and laughs and takes the eye-rolls in his stride. He smiles and does what people ask and pretends he's okay with not knowing who he is. He's friends with everybody but friends with nobody. He's a child of the shadows walking in the light where he shouldn't belong but keeps going to anyway. He's facetious and nonchalant on the outside because his heart is too heavy to carry on his sleeve so it stays inside of him, where it can't weigh anyone but him down.

He's dead in more ways than one but that doesn't stop him being the life of the party.

It's a party nobody had been invited to and nobody had seen coming, one that nobody had been aware of until it had finished and restarted but a party that they can't leave until the party allows it. He makes the most of it, drinking (blood) and dancing (his way around questions with words) each day, pretty sure that the sun and moon - which he watches every night because sleep is incredibly rare for him now - can probably tell he's constantly on edge but no-one else can, and that's what matters.

In the end, he chooses to dismiss his anguish entirely and fold his problems up, tucking them away from the world and anybody else who might see them. Slowly but surely, he crushes his anxieties and buries them under puns and jokes and references to a culture for which he is the only representative. His walls are built of faux-confidence and superficial optimism but nothing stops him from trying to hide his pain and pretend it doesn't even exist because if there's one thing Simon Lewis is, it's good at living life in the moment.

Well, living death in the moment.

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 _Please leave a review! Like it? Spot mistakes? Other requests?_


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